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After seven months, 4000+ miles, a dozen petrol stops, nearly 40 plug-ins and one punctuated tyre, it's time to say goodbye to our Audi A6 Avant plug-in hybrid petrol-electric estate. During that time it's run full-electric around London's busy streets, travelled mainly on petrol upcountry and around the remote Scottish Highlands and gently stretched its legs in-between, with zero range anxiety throughout.
The smart large executive estate in Cumulus grey metallic paint (a £545 option) always felt dressed for the occasion, neither too loud nor too retiring and was subtly enhanced by the early addition of an official Audi gloss black roofbox and rails with four shiny rings to prove it (£994 combined). This 430-litre box aided both our family of four's long-haul 1500-mile round-trip summer holiday by more than doubling the PHEV-affected rear seats-up space of 405 litres (compared to a regular A6 Avant's 565 litres) and also made light work of delivering our eldest daughter and stuff to university.
Talking of the PHEV aspect of the A6 Avant, despite not having off-street parking or home-charging, we were able to add electric miles relatively easily via a local 5kW street lamp charger. In part this was because an informal cabal of similarly-afflicted local PHEV or full EV driver neighbours has developed over the last year, which via text or WhatsApp coordinates our various cars into the crucial two spaces within reach of the post when needed. Gaining 34-47 electric miles per 2.5-3-hour charge, according to temperature has been useful.
But it has to be said, the cost benefit of doing so has eroded as the charger's electricity prices more than doubled last autumn from 24p to 49p per kWh plus a 35p plug-in fee each time. More recently the provider, Ubitricity, has brought the price down slightly to 45p at all times except the 4-7pm peak when it's been bumped up to a whopping 79p. Timing your charging run is thus crucial, especially now petrol prices have eased back to circa £1.50 per litre from their 2022 high of nearly £2.
On the plus side, as a PHEV with a 31g/km CO2 rating and an official 41-mile electric only range, BIK company car tax for the A6 Avant 50 TFSI e still sits in the 8% bracket (compared to a sub-40-mile PHEV attracting a 12% rate). The car's official 217.3mpg fuel consumption figure is real-world meaningless and should be ignored completely though. In our tenure, we achieved 42.3mpg, still decent for near five-metre-long, large and heavy 299hp car.
That size was greatly appreciated by taller, long-legged rear-seat passengers, and easy to manoeuvre and park in tight spots due to the 360-degree camera with overlaid reversing guides and bird's eye view, all easily spied through the car's 10.1-inch centre infotainment screen. As part of the £2295 Comfort and Sound pack, including a Bang & Olufsen premium stereo and multi-coloured interior LED lighting, it's been a useful and pleasing option.
Haptic feedback from that main touchscreen was hit and miss, sometimes needing a firm or repeated press, but commendably it did work with a thick gloved-hand during cold weather. The finger-writing feature on the lower screen - for satnav post codes and more - was haphazard and not worth the bother. The Apple CarPlay sync was smooth when required and the smartphone app handy for remotely monitoring charging process and more.
In conclusion, the A6 Avant 50 TFSI e quattro S Line feels like a grown-up's car. Sporty and dynamic on occasion, but smart, practical and eco-inclined for the most part. Looking forward to the new full-electric e-tron version prefaced by the 2022 concept already.
6th Report: Tyr-ing troubles solved
The subtle cabin shake and unsettling distant rumble after driving off were the dual early giveaways. At any time, but especially on a dark and rainy Thursday night in November, they're not what you want to hear, or have to investigate.
But neither the shake or rumble dispersed after 200 yards, so it was time to lower the electric windows and sure enough I heard what could only be a flat tyre. Pulling over and getting out, the rear driver's side was as flat as a pancake. Knowing a local garage very nearby would still be open, I dribbled on slowly to pump up the tyre, come home, park up and wait.
On Friday afternoon, almost 24 hours later, the tyre looked and felt good to the touch, but the A6's onboard screen still indicated low pressure. Time to seek a professional. Calling my nearest Kwik Fit branch phone number put me (unknowingly) through to its national call centre. The person on the other end was polite and helpful and explained they were manning the phones for the local centre that day, but that the tyre I was after - a 19in Michelin Pilot Sport 4 - was showing on their computer out of stock at that London SE27 branch and also the two closest to it (SE22 and SW16). Earliest deliveries of new stock would be the following Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning. But they also explained that sometimes the computer was not up to date, so put me through to the branch, whereupon the phone rang out for about 5-10 minutes before I gave up. I investigated ATS Euromaster branches (none were that near) and Halfords's mobile fitting service initially accessed online - but at this stage I wasn't sure if a spare was needed until the original tyre was checked over - so held fire.
On early Saturday morning I tried a local Audi dealer. The receptionist fielded the call professionally and put me through to the service department. I put the phone on speaker and carried on with my day. The 'hold music' proceeded to inform me in a short and tedious recorded loop how profitable the Marshall Group was and how important customer service was to the business. No-one picked up in about 10 minutes, maybe more. So I hung up again.
As I happened to be near the SE27 Kwik Fit branch on foot late Saturday afternoon I crossed the threshold and asked if they had the tyre. They checked and didn't, but also said they could inspect my tyre on Sunday morning to see if it needed fixing at all. Sunday morning came and the tyre was still visually okay, but the tyre pressure sensor was still flashing so I dropped off the car. 90 minutes or so later a call from Kwik Fit confirmed they'd found a match at the Croydon branch and had asked for it to be sent over. A further hour later it was fixed for £279.50. The puncturing culprit was a screw firmly jammed into the tread.
All told, from Kwik Fit to Audi, whenever I spoke to a human they were great. But whenever I got put through to another department by phone, no-one answered. Of course it was a distress purchase, but if I was spending £280 on anything else I'd expect the communications process to be more seamless. Fair play to the lads at Kwik Fit SE27 though, face-to-face they came through for me and now I'm back on the road.
People or things that purport to be something they're not, or to have done things they haven't, can be truly unsettling. Take for example, the amateur 'footballer' I knew when recruiting for my works team many moons ago who claimed to have been "on the books with Ipswich Town FC" and then turned out to be total rubbish. Questioning him about these 'facts' with a healthy dose of journalistic vigour post-match, he qualified his earlier statement by saying he had only bumped into the Ipswich Town football squad training in a park once and joined them for a runaround (maybe). The incident was decades ago, but the memory is still vivid and whenever I've occasionally met him since, I can't help thinking what else he's telling me now that probably isn't completely true either.
In a tangential leap, it's a bit like the fake lower air vents on (too many) modern cars - including to my distress, the largely blocked off ones on the Audi A6 Avant. Surely such deceit can make one wonder what else is not real about that product? Which is upsetting, because brands spend a lot of money persuading consumers to believe in them and their authenticity, and in the case of car brands in particular, that extends well beyond whether or not the car makes its driver feel cool, 'go-faster' or stylish and into matters of safety and security too.
All of which is a shame for Audi, which has carefully developed its brand from the early 1980s onwards through progressive technology and clean design. It has become truly premium and long on a par with Mercedes and BMW, its two German rivals once considered more than a few steps above. Audi isn't the only guilty party when it comes to exterior visual fakery, but it needs to stop, especially when so many car designers talk so seriously - and to your face - about 'form and function' and 'authentic materials' and then slap on fake vehicular front vents, like go-faster stripes on a slow car.
Luckily, the vast majority of the A6 Avant's technology offering is of high quality and function. One great example is the 360º camera with overlaid reversing guides and bird's eye view, all easily spied through the car's 10.1in centre infotainment screen and part of the Comfort and Sound pack. That £2,295 option specified on this car is not cheap, but does also include a banging Bang & Olufsen premium stereo and pleasing multi-coloured interior LED lighting to soften the blow.
And although the 360º camera bit is not a new feature to the industry, the system works well for this 4,939mm long car and especially in tight parking spaces with concrete walls for company on two sides and a big (but well-parked) van on another. Recently, in just such a scenario and with no other option than to try and fit into the space as all the other bays were taken, I trusted the visual guidance technology enough to continue my manoeuvre, even if the proximity sensors were having a sonic meltdown on almost all four corners. In order to keep enough reasonable space between me and the van adjacent, I finally parked so close to the wall on my driver's side that I had to climb over the front seats and get out of the rear passenger-side door to exit, but the car was safely parked and fitted in the space in a way I couldn't have managed solo and unaided.
This is vorsprung durch technik - progress through technology - as Audi's old advertising tagline sold and told us so well, not fake vents.
We mentioned the official Audi roof box last month for its holiday-enhancing skills. It's smart, doubles the luggage space and provides extra safety, as it negates the need to jettison the rear tonneau cover and avoids high-piled luggage obscuring rearward vision. And it came in handy again this month as my eldest daughter packed her numerous bags and suitcases up and headed off to university.
Despite repeated requests, no-one at Audi UK seems to know the extra capacity in litres the box can swallow though - granted it's an aero shape so hard to measure - but someone somewhere must have worked it out? Some digging online seems to suggest this box is slightly different from the current range, but the closest one in length now available at just over two metres offers 430 litres of space, which is more than the A6 Avant's 405 litres rear seats-up boot space so effectively more than doubles its load-lugging capacity. A good news story surely? Anyway, the box took care of all the big and bulky bags, which can otherwise clog up a boot space quickly and it can open from both sides too.
One measurement easily found is a weight limit of 95-100kg, which is basically a very big man, so if you can visualise one of those and scale it back a bit, five or six bags will fit in easily. There are also internal straps to stop things rattling around inside, but I found if the bags were numerous and heavy enough they stayed pretty still so there was no need to start strapping stuff down.
One real-world detail learned the hard way about this Audi roofbox is that the lid really needs to be very firmly pushed down to lock. If your lid is even slightly up on one side or other, the key won't turn and then it can't be removed from the lock, which can be disconcerting at a motorway services when you want to get back on the road. Standing on the car's doorsill helps with leverage and once you have the knack, it's no problem.
The other info we didn't have in time for our last report was the Audi roofbox's price. This also appears to be a bit of a mystery to Audi, but some digging found one similar online for £752 plus £242 for the right roof bars. That's just shy of £1,000, which is a serious lump of cash - and also requires a large space to find if you want to take off the roofbox and bars for fuel efficiency reasons for the rest of the year. But despite those factors there are no short-term hire options from Audi dealers, which seems like a missed opportunity for a dealer/customer interaction in between leases or purchases, if not a big earner for the dealer.
Meanwhile, after our long-haul holiday - where more petrol was drunk by this PHEV than electricity consumed - overall miles per gallon has been improving again as more electric charges punctuate the pump visits. Over the past two petrol fill-ups (with seven circa 40-mile electric boosts) the average consumption recorded is 53.3mpg. That's decent, but while the petrol prices near me have come down from almost £2 a litre to a more manageable £1.58 at local supermarkets, the price of electricity is soaring. At the end of August 2022, the price per kilowatt/hour at my local 5kW lamppost charger jumped from 24p to 32p (with a 35p fee introduced each time you plug-in) and at the start of October catapulted to 49p, or double the pre-September price. That makes charging this PHEV for 3.5 hours cost £8 for 40 miles, and far less attractive in relation to petrol than the £3.60ish it cost before.
You can learn a lot from driving a fully-loaded car for 1,500 miles within a short space of time, like my recent holiday from London to the Scottish Highlands and back. Fresh from that mission, here are my findings. The A6 Avant 50 TFSI e quattro feels like a smart car wherever you go. Whether that's driving through a fancy bit of London, or 'filling up' in every sense, at a Scottish village garage, with great value hot Bridie pies and where petrol is £1.61 per litre (thank you Stewart & Smart, Milnathort).
Even with an official gloss-black Audi roof box, you never feel too flash (thank you Audi PR) and while up in the Highlands any roofbox marks you out as a probable tourist, it was a very handy addition to this Avant's storage. Firstly, because its PHEV-affected rear seats-up space isn't huge at 405 litres compared with a regular A6 Avant's 565 litres or even plug-in estate rivals like the Merc E-Class (480), Skoda Superb (510) or Volvo V90 Recharge (560). And secondly, with four people aboard, those rear seats can't fold and although our luggage would have probably squeezed in up to the roof with the tonneau cover removed, the feeling of security (and rearward vision) from having the lighter bags tucked away in the roofbox and the tonneau cover auto-sliding magically over the boot's contents every time we blipped 'lock' in a busy service station or inner-city Glasgow hotel car park, was very reassuring.
Comfort and space all round was great, aided by the A6 Avant's long 2,924mm wheelbase, decent seat adjustment options and a firm-but-fair ride. Roads ranged from twisty, narrow Loch-huggers and hill-climbers to wider and curvy A-roads and motorways and the A6 Avant's solid-but-easy steering was happy over all of them, although my passengers preferred the straighter roads. More phone charging points would have been handy, but the two under the centre armrest at least give equal access to front and rear. Upfront, the central screen's satnav found remote places we had no idea how to get to and integrated well with Apple Carplay when required.
EV charging options were sparse, but we did manage three. The first was a regular Pod Point in Cumbria - a system I have the app for already and on which I was pleased to find I also had some credit. But the second one, Urban Electric, was a first for me - and I suspect most, as a trial system in just a few UK locations so far - and involved a metal post that rose from the pavement upon demand and then neatly lowered itself below ground afterwards. The charge was free, although the space commands a pricey £7 for four hours' parking by Dundee City Council. Still, as a system that doesn't add to street clutter, it's interesting. Note to Urban Electric - allow longer than 60 seconds to plug-in before your post drops back into the pavement - newcomers need more time to get acquainted! The third was a Zap-Home point located via Zap-Map, which allows private owners to share their parking spot and charger, on this occasion managed with the Co Charger app (bringing the number of EV-related apps downloaded to my phone to 11).
Easier to find, but not necessarily at a good price per litre, were petrol stations. We went for lesser-spotted town or village garages (£1.61 & £1.64) and city supermarkets (£1.67) and only once had to take the hit at a motorway service station (£1.86), veering away from others charging £1.95. To cover 1,500 miles, we spent £289 on petrol, £10 on electric, £1.20 to pump up all the tyres for the extra weight and scored a 39.8mpg overall economy figure. With four grown-ups on board plus all their luggage (and some fine whisky among the return-leg roofbox booty) £300 is a very reasonable family holiday travel expense. And for the more remote parts of Scotland where trains, buses (or even milk) are far, far away, there can't be many more convenient, comfortable and cost-effective forms of transport.
89.2 miles per gallon isn't bad-going. Sure it's nowhere near Audi's La-La Land official PHEV consumption figure of 217.3mpg for the A6 Avant 50 TFSI e quattro S Line, but nonetheless my first 'real-world' economy figure suggests I've been able to plug-in a fair amount in my first six weeks with the handsome estate. Indeed, I've managed ten electric charge-ups versus one petrol refill. The solo petrol station visit was far from long either.
I used just 18 litres to brim the tank to gain the impressive, if somewhat misleading, 89.2mpg mentioned at the top of this paragraph.
How so? Well compared with a few years ago when I first had a plug-in VW Golf GTE outside the same house, but at a time of far fewer public charging options, only about 18-22 miles were possible to gain from scarce public chargers far from home and still took three-to-four hours to achieve. A PHEV for me back then simply didn't make sense. More recently, during the 2020-2021 lockdown with a Volvo XC40 PHEV and closer charging options, about 25-28 real electric miles were possible in a similar time frame, but my nearest lamp post charger lacked a dedicated EV bay and was beset with non-moving, non-EV cars. Charging opportunities were few.
But times and tech change. Firstly, the A6 Avant's good-sized battery with a usable capacity of 14.4kWh translates to about 40 miles of electric-only range chargeable in about 3.5 hours and secondly, and crucially, one of the two-to-three spaces in cable reach of my nearest lamp post charger are now regularly free. Why? Because the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) brought in by Transport for London in October 2021 inside the North and South Circular Roads (I live just inside the southern edge) has forced many London residents to sell their pre-EU4 emission-standard petrol old bangers and/or move a few modern, but not modern enough, pre-EU6 diesels to roads on the non-restricted south side of the South Circular. I know that change has messed up the lives of some neighbours, costing them £12.50 to park outside their own houses, a fee they sometimes stomach when needing to load up the family car for a holiday for example. But the plus side for me is that I can now usually find a spot near my beloved lamp post and charge up easily.
Many talk about the cold weather reducing EV range, but lately the very hot weather has definitely increased it. Gaining the A6 in late June, I've never seen less than 37 miles secured after a full recharge, and in that instance, turning off the aircon immediately made the EV-only range jump to 41 miles. In the UK's mid-July record-breaking temperature week, the driver display once showed 47 miles after a charge (see photo). And if you can keep the aircon off or down - not always possible on longer hot-day trips of course - all of those electric miles seem to count, for example, for every mile driven, the EV range drops by the same amount. That's not something that could always be said for our otherwise excellent, previous Vauxhall Mokka-E long-termer.
We've even got the My Audi App to work. After seemingly ascertaining the inside leg and many other details of both me and the car, I now know when those 40-odd electric miles have been achieved with a glance at my iPhone and from the comfort of my front room. Then I just pop round the corner to unplug and move, so another PHEV or EV neighbour can grab the space and plug at that oh-so-handy 0.24 pence per kWh. Keep it a secret.
When friends and family ask me for 'next car' recommendations I've often suggested the Audi A6 Avant, especially to friends with families who go on fairly regular big missions. It's very smart without shouting too loud and also super-spacious. It feels like a car you can just chuck things in and go.
There was a regular hybrid A6 in the Mk4 edition (2011-2018) but it wasn't until mid-way through the current fifth-generation model, that plug-in hybrid versions have become available in the UK. For the next half-year we're going to evaluate the 299hp 50 TFSI e quattro, which can dispatch 0-62mph in 6.3 seconds, and also has a good-sized battery with a usable capacity of 14.4kWh, which translates to about 40 miles of electric-only range. As we don't have off street parking we'll be hoping to top that up as often as possible from our local neighbourhood charging lamp post.
Having got used to a full-electric car over the previous nine months, it's a process that holds no fear, takes about 3-4 hours from the 5kW post charger and still only costs 0.24 pence per kWh. Having a PHEV rather than a BEV also means longer journeys hold no fear either - or at least dispense with the need for military planning. Case in point: just one week in with the new Avant, I had to make a work trip to Milton Keynes from south London - via Hackney to pick up a photographer and his not inconsiderable equipment - conduct an interview in Milton Keynes, drop the photographer off at Luton Parkway on the way back, then steam down to Goodwood for a pre-Festival of Speed show dinner, attend the event the next day and get back to London the following evening. All in all, that 48-hour, 240-mile round trip was conducted without a whiff of range anxiety (or a fill-up). Blissful, except for the eventual re-fuel, at least made less painful by using a cheaper (but still 1.87 per litre) supermarket petrol station.
Those early journeys proved pretty comfortable upfront and the large boot - 405-1535-litre min/max - swallowed all that was thrown in it, although I've already repositioned the charging cable bag towards the innermost part of the boot to make more space near the load lip. I'm also questioning the need to carry three different cables when I only ever use one. No doubt the day I take the other two out I'll need them, so for now they're all staying put.
The A6 Avant 50 TFSI e quattro looks and feels like a very premium car and has a very premium price. In mid-range S Line trim, its £60,340 OTR buys matrix LED headlights, 19in wheels plus lane departure warning safety kit. The only cost options are Daytona grey pearl effect paint (£685) and the comfort and sound [ack (£2295), which includes a Bang & Olufsen sound system, multi-coloured interior LEDs and parking assist with parking aid plus with 360-degree view cameras - which have already come in extremely handy when on-street parking the A6 Avant's near five-metre length.
From an economy and tax proposition, this model registers 31g/km of CO2 and crucially an official 41 miles of electric range, which means it only attracts a 8% BIK band for 2022-23. By comparison, the BIK rate for a PHEV with an official EV range of 39 miles or less jumps up four percentage points - to 12% this tax year. That BIK distinction and saving is definitely worth having and also makes charging more worthwhile too. Aside from the 240-round trip mentioned, we've managed to stay almost entirely on electric charge for other local trips, but will be monitoring that balance of powertrain resource in the coming months among many other new features.
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